There There

There There

by

Tommy Orange

When readers first meet Jacquie, she is an eighteen-year-old girl going wild on Alcatraz during the Native occupation of the island in the early 1970s. She drags her younger half-sister, Opal, along on her adventures, but the girls drift apart as Jacquie flirts with an older boy named Harvey. After Harvey turns a “no into a yes” and assaults Jacquie, she becomes pregnant with his child, and later gives the baby up for adoption. When readers next meet Jacquie she is in her late sixties, and is eleven days sober. She is struggling to keep a hold on that sobriety as she attends a painful professional conference on substance abuse and suicide in Native communities. Jacquie has given her three grandsons to her sister Opal to raise, unable to do a good enough job herself in the painful wake of her second daughter Jamie’s suicide. At the conference, Jacquie successfully abstains from drinking, reconnects with Harvey in a chance encounter, and meditates on the ways in which alcohol is like a spider’s web—both a trap and a home. Jacquie ultimately decides to accompany Harvey to the Big Oakland Powwow, sheepish and nervous but hoping to reconnect with her sister and her grandsons. Jacquie is strong, resilient, and complicated, but she considers her own faults, admits to her mistakes, and ultimately allows herself the privilege of being around her family after years of walling herself off out of fear and doubt.

Jacquie Red Feather Quotes in There There

The There There quotes below are all either spoken by Jacquie Red Feather or refer to Jacquie Red Feather. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Cultural Identity vs. Personal Identity Theme Icon
).
Part I: Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield (1) Quotes

“One of the last things Mom said to me when we were over there, she said we shouldn’t ever not tell our stories,” I said.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” “I mean having the baby.”

“It’s not a story, Opal, this is real.”

“It could be both.”

“Life doesn't work out the way stories do. Mom’s dead, she’s not coming back, and we’re alone, living with a guy we don’t even know who we’re supposed to call uncle. What kind of a fucked-up story is that?”

Related Characters: Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield (speaker), Jacquie Red Feather (speaker), Vicky, Ronald
Page Number: 60
Explanation and Analysis:
Part II: Jacquie Red Feather (1) Quotes

Jacquie kneeled in front of the minifridge. In her head she heard her mom say, “The spider's web is a home and a trap.” And even though she never really knew what her mom meant by it, she’d been making it make sense over the years, giving it more meaning than her mom probably ever intended. In this case Jacquie was the spider, and the minifridge was the web. Home was to drink. To drink was the trap. Or something like that. The point was Do not open the fridge. And she didn’t.

Related Characters: Jacquie Red Feather, Vicky
Related Symbols: Spiders
Page Number: 101
Explanation and Analysis:

“There’s gotta be some reason for all this. That we would meet like this,” Harvey said, holding the elevator by putting his arm across the threshold.

“The reason is we’re both fuckups and the Indian world is small.”

Related Characters: Jacquie Red Feather (speaker), Harvey (speaker)
Page Number: 115
Explanation and Analysis:
Part III: Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield (2) Quotes

Opal pulled three spider legs out of her leg the Sunday afternoon before she and Jacquie left the home, the house, the man they’d been left with after their mom left this world. There’d recently been blood from her first moon. Both the menstrual blood and the spider legs had made her feel the same kind of shame. Something was in her that came out, that seemed so creaturely, so grotesque yet magical, that the only readily available emotion she had for both occasions was shame, which led to secrecy in both cases.

Related Characters: Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield, Jacquie Red Feather, Orvil Red Feather
Related Symbols: Spiders
Page Number: 165
Explanation and Analysis:
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Jacquie Red Feather Quotes in There There

The There There quotes below are all either spoken by Jacquie Red Feather or refer to Jacquie Red Feather. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Cultural Identity vs. Personal Identity Theme Icon
).
Part I: Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield (1) Quotes

“One of the last things Mom said to me when we were over there, she said we shouldn’t ever not tell our stories,” I said.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” “I mean having the baby.”

“It’s not a story, Opal, this is real.”

“It could be both.”

“Life doesn't work out the way stories do. Mom’s dead, she’s not coming back, and we’re alone, living with a guy we don’t even know who we’re supposed to call uncle. What kind of a fucked-up story is that?”

Related Characters: Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield (speaker), Jacquie Red Feather (speaker), Vicky, Ronald
Page Number: 60
Explanation and Analysis:
Part II: Jacquie Red Feather (1) Quotes

Jacquie kneeled in front of the minifridge. In her head she heard her mom say, “The spider's web is a home and a trap.” And even though she never really knew what her mom meant by it, she’d been making it make sense over the years, giving it more meaning than her mom probably ever intended. In this case Jacquie was the spider, and the minifridge was the web. Home was to drink. To drink was the trap. Or something like that. The point was Do not open the fridge. And she didn’t.

Related Characters: Jacquie Red Feather, Vicky
Related Symbols: Spiders
Page Number: 101
Explanation and Analysis:

“There’s gotta be some reason for all this. That we would meet like this,” Harvey said, holding the elevator by putting his arm across the threshold.

“The reason is we’re both fuckups and the Indian world is small.”

Related Characters: Jacquie Red Feather (speaker), Harvey (speaker)
Page Number: 115
Explanation and Analysis:
Part III: Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield (2) Quotes

Opal pulled three spider legs out of her leg the Sunday afternoon before she and Jacquie left the home, the house, the man they’d been left with after their mom left this world. There’d recently been blood from her first moon. Both the menstrual blood and the spider legs had made her feel the same kind of shame. Something was in her that came out, that seemed so creaturely, so grotesque yet magical, that the only readily available emotion she had for both occasions was shame, which led to secrecy in both cases.

Related Characters: Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield, Jacquie Red Feather, Orvil Red Feather
Related Symbols: Spiders
Page Number: 165
Explanation and Analysis: